The purpose of this paper is to outline the ethical considerations when doing research in the open. Specifically, the author is doing her PhD data collection using a publicly viewable blog. A blog is a special type of website that allows the author to post specific interview questions and readers of the blog are able to leave comments, which are typically publicly viewable and searchable. The author, a blogger herself, is studying the educational benefits of illness blogs. In some fields of study, blog information is considered to be in the public domain – not requiring informed consent nor explicit permission for inclusion in research studies. However, as Kozinets (2016) highlights, the participants are not knowingly participating in research. When the researcher seeks to use a blog for data collection, this is not the case. The blog itself is the tool for collecting informed consent and for data collection. Informed consent is solicited at multiple points in the study. Another question that arises when using publicly viewable blogs as data collection is who are the research participants? Anyone on the internet is able to respond to the research blog, and therefore, participate in the study. A third question arises relating to the safety of research participants, especially when the topic being studied could involve sensitive health information. In this paper the author will outline the ethical issues associated with doing research using publicly accessible blogs and provide recommendation for anyone wishing to use blogs to support their data collection efforts.

Reconstructing foundations of "home care" : in connection with the policy shift from hospital care to home care in Japan

Takenouchi, H. (Shizuoka University) ​​ Japan is presently aging so rapidly that the elderly ratio will reach 33.4% in 2035. The annual death toll will continue to increase and is estimated to peak at 1,670,000 in 2040. In Japanese society, while the size of the economy contracts by a decrease in population, the aging increases social security costs.The Japanese government has recently set forth measures for promoting “home care” in place of prevailing “hospital care”. “Home death” occupies, however, only 12.6%, while ""hospital death"" occupies 77.9% (as of 2010). To achieve the goal of increased home care, it is necessary to relieve major concerns both for patients and their families in the face of the chronic and terminal phases, such as care burden, expenditures, and fear of sudden changes, ensuring access to public medical and nursing care services.For this reason the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare has worked out measures for securing “independent residences for the elderly” in addition to one’s own houses. Though it seems desirable to increase in number and type the home-like places, some confusion is caused concerning the concept of “home” in the context of home care. For example, existing death certificates include group home and independent residences for the elderly as part of “home” in distinction with conventional “home” for the elderly, i.e. nursing home.The appearance of new types of ""home"" has made it difficult to follow the distinction between “home” and “facilities” as well as “home death” and “facility death”. This leads us through some fundamental questions concerning “home care”, and then into the meaning of “dwelling” as a basic human activity and “being-at-home” as the human way of being. Setting our sights on attaining well-being, this inquiry will present a vision for “home care” in the future Japanese society.

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